Families are being handed greater control over teenage accounts as Meta responds to growing pressure over children’s online safety ahead of sweeping UK social media restrictions.
WhatsApp is introducing new parental controls to allow parents to place tighter restrictions on their teenagers’ accounts – while keeping their children’s private messages and calls out of reach.
The Meta-owned messaging service said the optional controls will allow parents to manage privacy settings, receive notifications when their teenager joins or leaves a group and control who can see their child’s profile picture.
The changes come amid mounting pressure on technology companies over children’s online safety and months before sweeping new UK restrictions on social media are expected to take effect.
WhatsApp said in a statement: “All of these controls are being designed to support open conversations about how to use WhatsApp between parents and teens, while keeping everyone’s personal messages private.”
Parents will not be able to read messages sent or received by their children, with personal communications and calls continuing to be protected by WhatsApp’s end-to-end encryption.
The controls will instead provide parents with a range of options covering how their children use the service.
Parents will be able to select who can see a teenager’s profile photograph and who is permitted to add them to WhatsApp groups.
They will also be able to choose how their teenager uses Channels – the feature allowing organisations, businesses and public figures to send updates to followers.
The controls are designed to be straightforward to activate using a PIN created by the parent.
Teenagers will require that PIN if they subsequently want to disable the restrictions.
Parents will also be able to alter the settings or turn them off.
Social media analyst Matt Navarra told the BBC the fact the system remained voluntary represented an “obvious weakness”.
He added: “Meta is trying to show regulators we have a child safety system, we have parental controls and we’re rolling it out across our platforms.
“I think the big unanswered question is whether enough families will actually use it.”
Matt said the approach was “fairly convenient” for Meta because it placed some responsibility for managing teenage accounts on parents and children rather than relying entirely on the company to verify users’ ages.
The minimum age for a WhatsApp account in the UK is 13, although requirements vary between countries.
The company is also extending parental controls to Meta AI, the artificial intelligence assistant integrated into WhatsApp.
Parents will be able to choose between the standard 13-plus Meta AI experience and a stricter “Limited Content” setting intended to provide additional safeguards for younger users.
The changes arrive as Britain prepares for one of its most significant interventions in children’s use of social media.
The government announced in June that social media companies will be prohibited from offering their services to children under 16, with the first restrictions expected to take effect in spring 2027.
Ministers plan to require what they describe as rigorous age checks to enforce the rules.
The planned ban is expected to cover services including Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, Snapchat, YouTube and X.
WhatsApp, however, is not intended to fall under the social media ban because the government has classified services principally designed for messaging differently. Signal is also expected to be excluded.
WhatsApp gives parents new powers – but they can’t read teens’ messages
